Since 1957 for the inventor, and much earlier for the art, the use of a beeswax-borax system to prepare a water-in-oil emulsion has been available in the art. This is a classical method for preparing water-in-oil emulsions, i.e, which generally comprise at least about 2/3 by weight of an oil phase and no more than about 1/3 by weight of a water phase. Typically, prior art emulsions of this type comprise about 9-10% by weight of beeswax in the oil phase and about 1% Borax NF in the water phase. The oils used to produce the oil phase include mineral oil and petrolatum and viscosity was built with paraffin and other waxes such ozokerite in minor amounts.
According to the Merck index, beeswax is comprised of approximately 22-25% by weight of a 36 carbon acid. In addition, beeswax generally comprises approximately 25% by weight C.sub.35 -C.sub.36 alkanes and approximately 50% by weight of C.sub.35 -C.sub.36 esters. Using beeswax, in the traditional water-in-oil emulsion, the acid and borax together form a "soap" emulsifier in situ which facilitates formation of the water-in-oil emulsion. Although the system functions reasonably well, problems emerge as beeswax may vary in componentry from batch to batch and produce quality control problems. In addition, compositions which utilize beeswax often require strenuous mixing or homogenization to facilitate the production of a stable final formulation.
Since 1982, the present inventor worked with 12-hydroxystearic acid to prepare solid di-fatty esters such as 12-stearoyl, stearyl and stearate. One of the first products synthesized in this series was a "tri fatty" solid emollient which is still sold under the tradename Hetester SSS.
After almost 40 years of research, the present inventor tried to make a C.sub.36 then a C.sub.40 acid to mimic beeswax in the latter's ability to form water-in-oil emulsion compositions, but without the other "solids" present in beeswax, which he identified as possibly being responsible for certain non-optimal characteristics of these compositions. In addition, it was surmised that the synthesis of a synthetic beeswax fatty acid would be more controllable and therefore would result in more accurate quality control ("QC") during processing.